BAGHDAD, Iraq - A spate of attacks, including a suicide car bombing, pushed the number of U.S. military deaths in the Iraq campaign past 1,000, with the majority inflicted by an insurgency that bloomed after President Bush declared major combat over.

Fighting with Sunni and Shiite insurgents killed eight Americans in the Baghdad area on Tuesday and today, pushing the count to 1,003. That number includes 1,000 U.S. troops and three civilians, two working for the U.S. Army and one for the Air Force. The tally was compiled by The Associated Press based on Pentagon records and AP reporting from Iraq.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld cited progress on several fronts in the Bush administration's global war on terrorism and said U.S. enemies should not underestimate the willingness of the American people and its coalition allies to suffer casualties in Iraq and elsewhere.

"The progress has prompted a backlash, in effect, from those who hope that at some point we might conclude that the pain and the cost of this fight isn't worth it," Rumsfeld told a Pentagon news conference. "Well, our enemies have underestimated our country, our coalition. They have failed to understand the character of our people. And they certainly misread our commander in chief."

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry issued a statement saying the United States joined the friends and families of those who died in mourning their loss.

The 1,003 figure includes deaths from hostile and non-hostile causes since the United States launched the Iraq campaign in March 2003 to topple Saddam Hussein's regime. All but 138 of the U.S. deaths came after Bush's May 1, 2003 declaration of an end to major combat operations after Saddam fell.

The U.S. military has not reported overall Iraqi deaths. The Iraqi Health Ministry started counting the dead only in April when heavy fighting broke out in Fallujah and Najaf. However, conservative estimates by private groups place the Iraqi toll at least 10,000 - or 10 times the number of U.S. military deaths.

The 1,000 mark was surpassed after a surge in fighting that has killed 17 U.S. service members in the past four days. A soldier was killed early today when a roadside bomb struck a convoy near Balad, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad. Two soldiers died in clashes Tuesday with militiamen loyal to rebel Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Five other Americans died Tuesday in separate attacks, mostly in the Baghdad area. Seven Marines were killed Monday in a suicide car bombing north of Fallujah. Two soldiers were killed in a mortar attack Sunday.

In the insurgent-held city of Fallujah today, U.S. warplanes struck suspected militant hideouts used to plan attacks on American forces, the U.S. military said. At least two people were killed in the strikes, hospital officials said.

Witnesses said a series of explosions rocked the city before dawn and again later in the day and that jets swooped low over eastern and southern neighborhoods.

Today's attack targeted a militant "command and control headquarters that has recently been coordinating attacks" against coalition forces, the military said in a statement.

On Tuesday, U.S. jets fired several missiles into Fallujah in retaliation for militant attacks on Marine positions outside the city, the military said. Four people were killed and 11 wounded in those strikes, Fallujah hospital officials said.

In a statement late Tuesday, Marine spokesman Lt. Col. T.V. Johnson said "significant numbers of enemy fighters (up to 100) are estimated to have been killed" by Tuesday's missiles. The claim could not be verified, and Johnson acknowledged that U.S. forces have "not entered the city of Fallujah."

In new violence today aimed at officials seen as collaborators with American forces, gunmen kidnapped the deputy governor of Anbar province, the Interior Ministry said.

Gunmen opened fire on Bassil Ahmed's car and seized him after the vehicle stopped, Interior Ministry spokesman Col. Adnan Abdel Rahman said. Ahmed's son was injured during the shooting in Anbar, a stronghold of Sunni insurgents.

In Baghdad, gunmen killed Col. Ismail al-Ayal, the assistant director of the Interior Ministry's criminal investigation department, after opening fire on his car as he headed to work, Rahman said.